What Touches Human Flesh
by Tiamat's Child
Summary: The Homunculus wants referents. Hohenheim tries to oblige. Manga Continuity. Spoilers for the Xerxes flashback.


strongTitle: /strong What Touches Human Flesh

strongAuthor:/strong Tiamat's Child

strongFandom: /strong Fullmetal Alchemist Manga

strongWord Count: /strong 625

strongRating: /strongK+

strongCharacters/Pairing: /strong Hohenheim, the Homunculus.

strongSummary: /strong The Homunculus wants referents. Hohenheim tries to oblige.

strongWarnings: /strong None.

strongNote:/strong Written for lj user="fma_fic_contest", prompt 93: "Cold". Spoilers for the Xerxes flashback.

lj-cut text="What Touches Human Flesh"strongWhat Touches Human Flesh/strong

"What is it like, being cold?" the Homunculus asked one morning when Hohenheim walked into the lab shaking, his hands all atremble, struggling not to hunch into himself, or break his teeth by letting them clatter together too hard.

"What?" he managed, not entirely sure he believed that he'd heard the question.

"What is it like, being cold?" the Homunculus repeated.

"It's - Oh, I don't know," Hohenheim said, taking hold of the broom and starting to set up his daily rhythm of sweeping. "It makes everything harder, it's so annoying!"

"Yes, I can see," the Homunculus said.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Hohenheim snapped, and spun away.

"I was expressing sympathy, " the Homunculus said primly.

"Hmph," said Hohenheim, and swept quietly for a minute or two before asking, more quietly. "What do you mean, 'What is it like?' Doesn't your flask get cold sometimes? Glass is always getting cold, I know, and sometimes when I pick your flask up, it feels cold to me."

"Glass is an excellent conductor," the Homunculus said. "That's very true, Hohenheim, very good." Hohenheim rolled his eyes. "But I'm not built to feel it the way you are, I don't think."

"So what's it feel like for you?"

"I don't know, that's why I want to know what it feels like for you. I," the Homunculus said grandly, "construct my conception of my reality by analogy."

"What's that mean?"

"I ask other people, which in my case means you, about their experiences and compare my experiences and that's how I know if mine are - " He paused. "I hesitate to say 'normal' - "

"But how do you know if mine are normal?"

"I've been operating on trust," the Homunculus said.

Hohenheim sighed. "I'll ask around," he said.

"But I want to know what you think! Feel, are, do. It is, after all," and here the slice of a wicked smile flashed mercury quick across the Homunculus's surface, "the sum of our experiences that comprises our selves."

Hohenheim gave him a dubious look and blew a strand of hair out of his face. "All right," he said, shepherding some inconsequential grains of dust out from under a table. "When you're not really cold it's just on your skin. But it goes down deeper than that, when it just gets a little colder, and your body kind of - seizes up. You start shaking."

"But you don't shake only because you're cold," the Homunculus said, with a vibration in his voice that came very near to purring.

"No," said Hohenheim. "No, there's all kinds of reasons for shaking - when you're tired, or frightened, or excited sometimes. But when you're cold it hurts. Not the shaking, but the cold. The cold will hurt, and sometimes you can't feel your hands or your feet, so it's as if they're not yours anymore, and that means you can't use them right."

"Not yours?" the Homunculus said. "Does it really feel that way?"

"It can," Hohenheim said. "I suppose you don't feel that."

"Oh, no," said the Homunculus. "I am always myself. Although of course I don't have extremities. I'm entirely a core mass."

"So you are," said Hohenheim. "It's the center of the body that stays warm the longest, and sometimes you'll try to huddle around that center, curling around your belly and chest, to keep warm." He sighed. "Although I don't know if that works. Mostly it seems to just make my shoulders hurt."

"Perhaps," said the Homunculus, "it works better if you are curling around another human."

Hohenheim laughed. "Probably. I haven't got anybody to curl around, though."

"Oh," the Homunculus said, dissolving and reforming, smoke and mouth and eyes and smile, "I'm sure that's only a matter of time."


End file.
